Monday, September 9, 2013

Game Review: Chrono Cross (PS Vita)

Presenting: Another man-versus-nature game from Japan!This time with world-hopping and possibly time travel! What do you mean you've seen this before?

Okay. Okay.
I have to say this. I must say it – despite my deep and abiding affection for
Chrono Trigger:

Chrono Cross
sucks.

The 1999
sequel to the 1995 RPG classic is a mess. It fails at two key elements of any
game: story and characters. Let me try to put this into a simple list for you,
dear reader:

Plot of
Typical 90's RPG:

Bad guy appears

Hero must
embark on quest

Hero meets
new friends

Hero goes on
numerous fetch quests

Hero fights
bad guy (may or may not be true villain)

Hero fights
true villain (may or may not be unexpected traitor)

World is
saved

You see how easy
that was? Now, it’s going to get a tad bit more
complex:

Plot of
Chrono Trigger: A boy and his friends are pulled back—and forward—in time because
of an extraterrestrial, time distortion-causing parasite called Lavos, which crashed
into the planet millions of years ago and wiped out the dominant humanoid reptile
species as well as an ancient magitech kingdom that managed to produce at least
four survivors who guide and/or antagonize the playable characters throughout
the game. Trust me, it all makes sense in the end.

Plot of
Chrono Cross: Boogers. Okay, here goes—Schala, princess of the aforementioned
ancient magitech kingdom, used her powers back in Chrono Trigger to teleport
the heroes to safety during their initial encounter with Lavos. She and Lavos
then fused into the Time Devourer, which went into sleep mode in a pocket
dimension beyond space and time. A piece of Lavos stayed behind in the physical
dimension and came to be known as the Frozen Flame, even though it looks like an
angry mutant lychee. Belthasar, one of the sages of the kingdom who had been
hurled into the future in Chrono Trigger, established a research facility to study
the Frozen Lychee and find out how to control time so he could save Schala. He reprogrammed
one of Chrono Trigger’s characters, Robo, to be the Prometheus Circuit in case
anything…untoward…happened. Naturally, the supercomputer of the research
facility went batshit crazy when Chrono Cross’ main character, Serge, was
bitten by a poisonous panther (???) and cried out for help, and Schala heard
him and was all, “This one particular child is very important, so I shall send
energy to where he is and wreak havoc on the supercomputer, FATE, thus
counterproductively placing his life in danger because now FATE wants him dead
for some reason, instead of me!” Herp derp.

Oh, and I
forgot to mention that the research facility was actually hurled back 10,000
years in the past when the researchers started their main experiment, which
then caused an alternate timeline where the humanoid reptile species evolved rather
than humans to throw in its two cents worth: the Terra Tower, which fought with
the human scientists and lost, so the humans split it into six “Dragon Gods,”
which are the source of the six Elements, but actually there’s a seventh one
that is the key to saving Schala…

To balance
out the ranting up to this point, let me say that Chrono Cross offers good gameplay
and unimpeachable music by the very talented Yasunori Mitsuda. The combat
system offers a ton of variety because it revolves around Elements, which are
color-coded to match the forces of nature (earth, fire, wind, water, darkness,
light). Each character has an innate elemental affinity, and so it pays to
either switch out characters for dungeon-like environments, or re-allocate
Elements to strong magic users so they cast spells that advantage the party.

Meanwhile,
the music is fantastic. There are tons of standout themes, like the gentle “Dream
Fragments,” the breezily inviting guitar-and-voice combo of “Radical Dreamers (Unstolen
Thoughts),” and the beautiful, soaring “Dragon God” for the penultimate boss
fight. Coupled with the scaling on the world map—which makes the characters
look tiny relative to their surroundings—the soundtrack provides an epic feel
to the game.

And now back
to the negative: Chrono Cross has too many characters. With only seven playables,
Chrono Trigger was able to focus on their backstories and development, and all
of them were good choices for fights. By contrast, Chrono Cross floundered badly in this department by having 40 characters, only a few of whom
are plot-important, useful for fighting enemies or bosses, or even interesting. Many character abilities and backgrounds are
esoteric and need guides; for example, Sprigg can mimic every monster she’s defeated, but apparently she has to beat it, and she has to
do it in her original form. And she’s an old lady armed with a stick! I like me
some Iron Grandmas, but that sounds like a lot of work. And how did she get stuck in Crayola world? Nobody knows.

1:3 usefulness ratio; one character out of three actually good.

It’s also
annoying to have to switch out Elements and equipment all the time, because I
wanted to give everyone a fair shake when they first joined my team. Fortunately,
the useless characters distinguished themselves very quickly so I could cut
them out of the roster early on. It was disappointing to have so many lame-ass companions, especially when I was trying to save time itself! At least, I think that's what I was doing in the game.

In
conclusion, Chrono Cross’ weaknesses deprive it of the timelessness of
its parent.

However,
since it came out in 1999, the year before the civilization-ending Day of Lavos
in Chrono Trigger, perhaps Chrono Cross’ real purpose was to make gamers
reflect about Life itself as we asked ourselves the following questions repeatedly
for forty-plus hours:

Why am I
here?

Who are
these people?

What the
hell am I supposed to do now?

Or maybe it
sucks.

This post
brought to you by Nutella that is two years past its expiration date. Still good.